Photo How To

It sounds like a reference to dull Halloween costumes, but I’ve always regarded unsharp masking as the Cadillac option for beefing up the acutance of my photos. Admittedly, this is probably just a reaction to the fact that unsharp masking has a complicated dialog box in Photoshop, and my reptilian brain is dazzled by lots of controls.

Q. For years I had planned to “upgrade” from my camera with an APS-C sensor to a camera with a full-frame or even midsize sensor. Since I’m retired, I no longer print my photos or try to sell them. I have some very nice full-frame lenses from my film camera days, so I could use them with a full-frame camera. But I display my photos only electronically on a TV or photo frame, which can’t display all of the image data that a larger sensor could capture. So, wouldn’t a larger sensor just be overkill?

(Editor’s Note: The following is an excerpt from Andrew Darlow’s new book, Focus and Filter: Professional Techniques for Mastering Digital Photography and Capturing the Perfect Shot , from Ulysses Press. Darlow has been a professional photographer and educator for over 25 years, and this is his fourth book. You can also read his story with tips for taking safari-quality photos at a zoo here.

Yesterday’s street photography tutorial by photojournalist Doug McKinlay was so popular that we decided to bring you another today. This one by Dutch fine art street photographer Vijce Vieth provides five great tips for shooting the streets at night.

Zoos, wildlife parks and farms are some of my favorite places to recommend taking pictures, especially when you are looking to build your portfolio with a diverse subject matter. They offer many opportunities to learn how to photograph rare animals as well as teach you how to cope with challenging environments and locations, similar to what you would encounter if you were on safari on the savannahs of Tanzania or tracking tigers in the jungles of Borneo.

A common question among digital photographers is, “How much better is a Raw file than an image captured as a JPEG?” The video below attempts to answer this question “once and for all,” so take a look and see if you agree.

Today’s sophisticated cameras feature a variety of shooting modes from Manual to fully automatic Program, and a couple others in between. In this photography primer you'll learn all you need to know about these different settings and which mode is best for capturing different types of scenes.